Road to Recovery – Ryan Allan

Since moving onto a proper ACL recovery program, I have been at the gym a lot more frequently. As I need to constantly improve my leg strength to regain full functionality, I need to keep up with my rehab exercises. This has resulted in me going all 7 days most weeks, working on my legs every second day. It has been a challenge to keep up with, but I have definitely seen the benefits; in the beginning, I quickly regained a lot of leg strength.

My initial concern of being so active was that I might be putting my knee in jeopardy. But it has never nagged me or made me worry in any way, and I am constantly feeling I can do more every time I go back. Considering my return to walking and full ACL rehab was so prolonged, I feel like my efforts have been making up for this.

But there was still a distinct difference between my legs, and my left was still very skinny in comparison to my right. However, soon after shooting this episode, I started doing leg press, curls and extensions with one leg at a time. This allowed my left leg to do all the work on its own, and since doing this I have both seen and felt major improvements.

In this video, I demonstrated a lot of exercises I began in my recovery program, including leg press, dumbbell deadlifts, squats, crabs walks, etc. They were tough to start with, but I was quickly finding I could add more and more weight to increase the difficulty. Before I knew it, I had the leg strength to climb staircases, unassisted by railings. I also began jogging, although work needs to be done before I really show anyone this – it was kind of a half jog, half stagger by this point in time, and it’s still not a hundred percent now.

Swimming was a huge help to me, although I wasn’t able to get footage of it. My physiotherapist was quick to get me into the pool – way quicker than I thought. I was instantly surprised with how well my knee functioned, even when it was still reasonably weak. Doing laps served me very well, particularly around December time when I first got onto full ACL rehab. I will try and show you some footage with how I’m going by episode 9.

I am able to do nearly all day-to-day life activities now, and considering how quickly things are coming together, it probably won’t be a very long time until you see me back in the ring. I still have a way to go, but the hard work is definitely paying off.